Love Grows
by Keiron Yoshi Harman
Summary: This is my first ever fanfic, and is set two years after the team returned from Time Compression, as explained in the prologue of the first chapter. Enjoy!


**Prologue**

Four years had passed since 'that incident.' That incident was no mere incident, but more of a life-changing event. Was it possible that one person could have changed the entire fate of the world and its residents? Was it actually possible that fate could be changed? And why is it that even if fate can be changed so much, the person who changes it can often get little or no recognition for this almighty achievement? It's possible to think that these are impossible, but nothing is impossible, surely. If one person can start life by becoming an orphan, be sent to an orphanage with a kind woman as the Matron, have loads of friends there, be taken to Balamb Garden, trained as SeeD, forget everything about his childhood, get sent on a mission, find love, see his rival get taken by a sorceress… Well, the list goes on. We all know that story. Anyway, he travels through time after finding out that everyone he had been working with or battling were the people he knew from his orphanage. But now we go on to find out the story of the nearer future than the future the normal Squall went to before going back in time to see the past Squall and Edea, where the future Ultimecia comes to see the past Squall, Edea and normal Squall. This is just two years after Garden took off with Cid & Edea on board, Selphie & Irvine just getting together and Rinoa and Squall finally, and unfortunately for most, getting together. So thanks for reading through this bit, and on with the story.

**Chapter 1 – The Mission**

"Would Squall, Quistis, Zell, Selphie, Irvine, Rinoa, Fujin, Raijin, Seifer & Cid please report to the bridge? Repeat: Would Squall, Quistis, Zell, Selphie, Irvine, Rinoa, Fujin, Raijin, Seifer & Cid please report to the bridge? Thank you"

Nida's voice boomed out over the hallways of Garden. He was probably very annoyed with having to fly Garden, considering he was a SeeD, but nobody else could so… By the time everyone had got to the top, Garden had stopped on the tip of the Esthar continent and Nida was already talking to Cid, Squall, Rinoa and Quistis. Typically, the last one to arrive was Irvine, who had been asleep. He still looked it: his hat was lopsided, his coat was caught on his clothes and those clothes were NOT normal.

"What's goi-mrf…" Irvine muttered, or asked or something. Nobody could understand the last part due to his collapse onto Selphie's shoulders, who then proceeded to move and laugh as Irvine fell to the floor with a crash. Seifer was laughing as well, showing his less "maniacal I-want-to-kill-everyone sorceress'-knight" side. Seifer had finally become a SeeD, on his fifteenth attempt, but he'd still made it. Fujin and Raijin became SeeDs the year after, which didn't please Seifer. They'd made it first try. It seemed Cid was able to see his good side, even after the "evil lunatic in charge of the Galbadian Empire" period. Talking of Cid, it wasn't just him in charge of Garden. Squall may not have received fame, but everything he had done obtained him a share in the control of Garden. Considering he did have complete control when Cid had cowardly fled to the former evil lunatic sorceress' (also known as his wife's or Matron's) house, Squall thought this was a fair deal, and didn't expect much more, so he accepted Cid's offer. Anyway, after the team had been through a small debriefing, and a torturous speech/lecture from Kadowaki about "others care, support your allies, blah, blah, blah," they were forced to split into teams. Cid decided what those teams would be and the others would have to stick with that, which Squall wasn't too pleased with. He only got to have a part in saying whether or not students became SeeDs and where Garden went when there were no missions. He absolutely hated being on board, and relied on missions to get away from it all, really.

"You're going to have to go to Balamb to get a train to Deling City. From there-" Cid started, before Selphie cut him off. "Hey! We can take the Ragnarok!"

"Fine, you can take the Ragnarok," Cid sighed, before carrying on with the plan, "Go to the Desert Prison. There is somebody in there that we need to rescue. The Galbadians plan to have him executed. He has managed to get out of his cell once, but they caught him and took him to the very top room of the prison. However, when I mentioned the three towers, he had no clue as to which section he was in. You're going to have to split into three teams. They will be as follow: Squall, Irvine and Raijin will be together, Fujin, Zell & Selphie will go in a team, and Seifer, Quistis and Rinoa will be the final team." Seifer glared at Quistis, then Cid. Obviously the "good luck" remark from the Dollet mission that Squall had become a SeeD on still left its mark on him.

Selphie ran straight in first, barging past everyone, with Irvine following intently… Yet again. Selphie knew where she was going perfectly. Straight in, turn right, round the railings, take the elevator up and straight forward, vaulting over the back of the pilot's seat. Irvine came up right behind her, practically squashing her when he fell forward, propping himself up with the seat. Zell went to his small corner to the left, Rinoa to the right of the elevator, Quistis next to Irvine, and Seifer, Fujin and Raijin pressured Squall into showing them round.

'How boring…' Squall thought as he wandered round, room after room, showing them pretty much the place they'd just come from.

"I can't believe we're on board the Ragnarok, ya know? I mean, we saw it so many times but never got to ride it, ya know?" Raijin stuttered, before getting kicked.

"Look out for take-off. Selphie isn't as good a pilot as she (and Irvine) likes to think." Squall calmly cautioned them, which was followed by the four of them being nearly knocked over by the ship suddenly rocketing up and then lunging forward, which succeeded in knocking the former Disciplinary Committee over. Squall, who was the only one close to standing, had taken precautions before take-off and was crouching on the floor. Seifer's face was right in front of him.

"Warned you." Seifer glared up at Squall and then leapt to his feet. He ran towards the elevator and went up top for the view, with the others in pursuit. When there, he could hardly believe his eyes

Seifer could hardly believe his eyes! He'd been on a boat before; he'd lived near the water all his life (even the orphanage parts he barely remembered) and he'd been in a flying Galbadia Garden, but he had never been going so fast this high up! The water was a blur of blue below his feet! He was staring in awe at the might of the dragon ship. He loved the thrill of traveling at speeds that normal civilians could only dream of seeing. Raijin was much the same, but Fujin had the same sort of attitude as Squall and Quistis did the first time they flew on board the Ragnarok. So, it's a ship, it's a bit faster than normal, so what? Before they knew what was happening, the desert prison appeared over the land that was appearing on the horizon. They swiftly landed on the desert and spoke to the guard at the entrance. He asked of their duty here, to which Seifer replied with a quick swing of the gunblade as a threat, followed by the same sort of reaction from the rest. The guard ran, and Selphie, Zell and Fujin followed to the secondary tower.

"Selphie, you're team leader," Squall shouted, and then added, "Quistis, you're in charge here. Good luck." With that, he ran from the tower towards the one to the remaining team's left.

"No guards, no traps from the looks of things, let's go!" Seifer laughed, enjoying that brief session of guard scaring. Quistis looked carefully, holding Seifer back.

"Never trust a Galbadian general's land. Deling created this place, there will be traps everywhere." It was only then that the desert started to pull them in.

"Everybody, get in quick!" Quistis was shouting, with Seifer trying to attack the sand, and, astonishingly, it helped a little. The sand stopped swallowing the three of them, but the next occurrence was a large price to pay…

"Is everyone OK? I wonder how the others coped... Oh no, here come the fights!"

Seifer, typically being Seifer, had his gunblade out and prepared to kill anything coming his way. However, Rinoa and Quistis had other ideas.

"Run!"

They grabbed Seifer's collar and leapt inside the prison, beginning to run up the long stairways, around the pathway, and carrying on up more stairs. Slowly. Damn monsters.

"OK, this thing is not looking nice." Zell was always the observant type. Selphie, the leader of this team, decided that a good offence is the best defence, and hit the beast in the face with nunchaku. He didn't react too kindly.

"Beasts these days… Honestly, they get angry over the tiniest little thing, and don't just keel over and die like they should," Selphie moaned, before hitting the Chimera again. Fujin then hit the beast with her shuriken, which left Zell with an easy kill. The team then went and saved the moronic guard, who'd decided it was good to try escaping the desert by running outwards, away from the prison. This usually requires looking ahead of you, and not running head first into an Anacondaur. After defeating the snake, the guard decided it would be good to carry on running.

"Forget him!" Zell shouted and went to the prison. Selphie called the guard back, but it was too late. Hexadragons don't really like people entering their territory. They remove people who enter their territory… Remove them from the entire planet. End their existence. Selphie, who was shocked at the nature of these beasts, was in a state of shock after seeing a guard being eaten alive. It wasn't everyday you saw something like that, even as a SeeD. Fujin and Zell lifted her up to her feet, and took her through. The guard allowed the three through after seeing his colleague go down in such a way. Selphie finally got to her feet and walked in a way that made her look like she'd only just woken up, also known as walking like Irvine. Zell was walking backwards casually, before tripping over a small rock on one of the top floors. It was right next to a cell with an open door. The cell had a window inside it which had been smashed. Zell looked at the rock, which had a piece of paper around it. Opening the paper, Zell found a note, which read:

"So why are you being killed? And what is Dollet like; I always meant to visit there." Below this there was a small signature of the writer of this letter. The response had obviously not been sent. They rushed to the top of the tower they were in, hoping that they had got it right.

Squall plowed through the various robotic monsters in this place, with Raijin randomly jumping to turn opponents into cards.

"Hey, you can turn these into items which sell high, ya know? It's great!" Squall ignored and Irvine appeared out of nowhere. He seemed to remember this place perfectly.

"It was me who rescued you lot last time, but did anyone say thank you? No. Well, I'm expecting more appreciation this time!" Squall nodded and followed the sniper. Raijin sat staring at his new SAM08G card for a while, before realizing he had to move in order to avoid monsters killing him on his first ever important SeeD mission. He leapt to his feet and ran up the staircase ahead of him, trying his hardest to keep up with Squall and Irvine, meanwhile avoiding monsters and robots. He was not your average SeeD, Raijin. Most SeeDs used GFs because they had to in order to survive, but Raijin didn't like any GF except for Quezacotl. He seemed to like the bird of thunder, despite its weak attack power. He finally managed to catch up with Squall and Irvine and complained instantaneously.

"So, we left you behind. You were staring at cardboard. Isn't it interesting? It doesn't move, doesn't fight, doesn't breathe," Irvine mocked, but Raijin still insisted that they were worth money.

"Not those ones, though. Only the rare ones are. I mean, I don't even collect but I have one of those ones. They are useless. And I doubt you'll get a rare card. Nobody I know has one." It was then that Squall pulled out his collection. His _full_ collection. Both team-mates stared in awe at the cards. Gilgamesh, Bahamut, Phoenix, even the new sets like Moomba and Shumi Elder were there! Squall grabbed the cards and carried on running up towards the top, the others in hot pursuit.

Towards the top, they looked at one of the cells.

"What happens if we do… this!" Irvine screamed, and threw himself against the door. What happened was that Irvine fell straight down against the railing behind them. Raijin, using his staff, battered down the door, finding a prisoner inside.

"So, Mr. Criminal-Guy, what do you know about this place and the people in it?" Irvine asked, finding out just one thing. He could see a smashed window in the distance, and had often seen rocks flying from that window to another in the last tower, and vice-versa. Squall, who didn't like the guy in front of him, decided he'd leave now, with the others following. As soon as the guy turned to leave, Squall turned to him, gunblade out. The guy backed off, and Squall hit the door several times to make sure the hole was too small to fit through. He then rushed off again, onwards up the tower.

"Cure!" Selphie shouted, wondering if it was possible to heal the guy. The first time they'd ever come here, there was an anti-magic field preventing self-curing. This was soon lifted after the escape of the three of them, and obviously it had been lifted due to the escape of this guy. The guy slowly got to his feet, and struggled over to Fujin, who leapt away. He reached Zell, who reacted in very much the same way. Selphie finally helped the sufferer, and asked why he was locked in this prison.

"I disobeyed the president: Vinzer Deling's son. I am sure you know what my punishment was to be. Is this correct, SeeDs?" It was the man that they had been searching for. By "man", this actually meant "young teenager."

"What's your name, and where do you live? We need to know something about you," Selphie calmly inquired. His name was Devin Almasy of Dollet. He was Seifer's son.

"We need to get out of here. He isn't up top, which is where they said he'd be." With that, Seifer leapt down to the floor below, and carried on doing so until he'd reached the bottom.

"Come on, it's faster!" he called to Quistis and Rinoa, and then, to his surprise, Rinoa did try jumping down. And, even more to his surprise, she succeeded in getting there faster than he had. Quistis, who was wearing her usual orange dress, decided it would be unwise to try this in those clothes and just climbed the railings to get down the staircases faster. By the time they'd reached the bottom, they could see Squall, Irvine and Raijin approaching in the distance.

"Hey, all we found was a rock. You?" Seifer asked. Squall described the rock-throwing the guy had been talking about, which solved one riddle. Now, where was Selphie's team…?

Fujin was surprisingly fast, considering her quiet, hidden attitude and they way she acted when she did anything, really. Even Zell, with his speed and strength, was struggling to stay ahead of her. It helped with her having the strongest weapon of the three of them, and Selphie was fairly slow, thanks to having to carry Devin, so she was being left behind. They reached the bottom eventually, with all but Devin out of breath. He decided to walk from now on, and they set out to find the other teams, which didn't take long. They were right outside the door.

"So you found him. Can I have a name?" Squall asked.

"Devin. His name's Devin and he's from Dollet." Selphie replied, watching Seifer's face carefully. Seifer stepped back, and produced his gunblade.

"There may be creatures around. Let's not hold back. Unleash everything you got to save this guy. That's our mission, right?" Everyone stared in astonishment at Seifer. It wasn't like him to be kind. The only ones who understood the simple truth were Selphie's team and Seifer himself.

Inside the Ragnarok, Devin struggled to talk to Seifer, but to no avail. It wasn't as though Seifer wanted anything to do with him ever, seeing as how he'd abandoned him in the first place. Before long, they'd contacted Cid for help. Selphie did the talking, and managed to tell Cid about Devin while out of hearing range of the others. They were told to take him home, and soon enough, they were at Dollet.


End file.
